Why Every Girl Needs a Bowie Knife to go with Her Pajamas...

So, anyone who's been reading my blog for any length of time (wow, writing that made me feel like Julie, from Julie and Julia) knows that I have a propensity for carrying bladed weapons. Now, whether this is a genetic throwback to times when some distant ancestor might well have had to thrash a saber-toothed cat while on the way to drop the Johnsons at the superbowl, or because I watched too many action movies as a kid, or because I hang out with SCA members and Civil War re-enactors and at the Highland games, has never been clear. But suffice to say, that normally, if you see me on any given day, there is a knife somewhere on my person. This includes days in which I never change out of my pajamas. Which turned out to be a really good thing last Saturday.

It rained on Saturday. Like all fricking day. And the wind howled. Like we had a tornado howled. Not joking. Anyway, the parental units went down to Galax, and I opted for staying at home so I could try and finish the first draft of Thornbriar (I did not succeed. It turns out that wrapping up the entire 'I solved the curse on your country now why don't you love me?' paradox isn't a snap thing, even when you know how it's going to turn out) and tape fence boards back on when the wind tore them off and tossed them like pick-up sticks while never changing out of my jammies. (if you don't know what pick-up sticks are don't point that out because you're young enough to fall into the whipper-snapper category and I will be forced to snark you)

Point is, I was home alone, in my pajamas, with a twenty-year old dog and a whole lot of bad weather. You know what happens with ancient dogs and thunderstorms right? I'll clue you in: it lightnings, then it thunders, then the shock waves from the thunder hit the ancient dog and it instantly has to go to the bathroom. Like right at that very moment instantly, not in like ten minutes when the eye of the storm is passing overhead and you have a halcyon interlude. Flash-boom-crack there I was staggering through the backyard with the blind-deaf-unsteady ancient dog as she tried to decided if she should pee by THIS patch of absurdly un-mown grass or THAT patch of absurdly un-mown grass.

While Ancient Mongrel and I were braving the savage winds and flash floods, Mother Nature was busy trying to rip the screen door off it's hinges. She was probably extra annoyed because I'd locked the other screen door completely down, double-latching the inside dutch door. The second entrance is just a simple screen door, and a lot easier to get through with a tottering old dog, so that's the one we'd left by. Well, about the third time Mother slammed the thing, it's little latch (one of those you just hook on an eye-hook) swung around like a pinwheel and voila it was a bulls eye! Aaaaand I'm neatly locked out in the back yard. With no phone. In a thunderstorm that had the Weather Alert station turning on auxiliary generators... and an Ancient Mongrel who had miraculously found just the right spot in which to pee and was ready to flop in front of the fireplace once more. So what's a girl to do?

Well, if you went to the Jones-Macgyver School of Preparedness, you'd do something spectacular. Like use wet mulch from under the picnic table combined with strips of your pajama bottoms to create a small fire via spontaneous combustion achieved through the internal heat of the decomposing mulch while using the Ancient Mongrel as a counterweight on a lever to pry the fire-weakened door from it's hinges so you and the Ancient Mongrel can swing through over the flames. But you happen to be a student of the Conan-Sonja School of Carrying Sharp Objects, you'd just whip out your long-knife and wriggle the blade between the door and door-facing, forcing it upward until you were able to pop that irksome little hook out of it's resting place in the eye-hook.

You can probably guess, based on the title of this post, which process I opted for. Just another use for my handy-dandy Bowie knife. Good thing I happened to strap its belt on over my $4 goodwill yoga pants pjs before I ventured out into the storm. You just never know when random sharp objects might save your patootie. See, everybody thinks I'm this big meany dragging around weapons, like an antiquated version of Hit-Girl from Kick-Ass. Yeah, not so much. I'm more likely to use my weapons for stuff like hacking my way into a can of bean, or breaking into my own screened porch...

Witty Me Not...

I was going to write something all snarky and cute for my first post-funeral blog post... but that ain't happening. Well, I'm sure it'll have a little snark somewhere, since I have next to no filter between my brain and my mouth/fingers. But I'm not putting a lot of effort into it. Anywho, here I sit with rain pounding outside and a bunch of angry ponies milling around their stalls. Of course, if we turned the ponies out, they'd have a stroke over getting their little piddies dirty and would be screaming to get back inside immediately. Yeah, um, no Snowy River brumby-types on this farm...

All of this rain was supposed to hit us last night. Correction, oh-my-God-the-world-is-ending hail storms were supposed to kill us all in our beds last night. I slept with kevlar and a flashlight, prepared to go running out to save my Demon Chickens, should the aforementioned oh-my-God-the-world-is-ending hail storms actually make an appearance. Yeah, no. Sleepytime with the kevlar went undisturbed. Well, except for the incident in which Ari rolled off the foot of the bed and managed to hook the top of my foot with a claw in his desperate bid to avoid falling the outrageous two feet to the floor, which wasn't even a full two feet, since my laundry is, ahem, do to be done and piled up in the floor at the foot of the bed. Point is, hail was a no show. Instead, it's here today, like an unexpected visit from that annoying, gossiping aunt whom you love, but also don't really want lounging at your kitchen table, looking through your bills while you're getting cream out of the fridge, or sorting through your bathroom medicine cabinet while 'powdering her nose'. I don't mind the weather being unpredictable. I just mind weathermen promising that they're 'right on top of it Rose' while really, they have no idea what Mother Nature is up to, nor can they hint at what she might throw at you. Some day, I may actually learn my lesson and not listen to them.

On the writing front, I'm on the last two chapters of Thornbriar, I'm in the last third of Red Chief, and I've started a new WIP, as-of-yet untitled, which is a contemporary sort of Beauty and the Beast retelling. I know, I know. ANOTHER one. What can I say? I'm a sucker for any story about loving yourself for who you are, and in my versions, the Beast never gets shafted for a stuffy 'Prince Charming'...

I also have one query out. One small, lonely query. If this one gets handed an explody device, I'm officially shelving Evernow. Okay, I actually cried a little just then, seeing that written. I won't give up on her, of course, but if I'm going to beat the zombie herds in the foot race that is the route to publication, I can't have dead weight slowing me down. And a story that everyone seems to love, but no one really cares about, is a millstone around my neck. I'm spending time trying to put Evernow in a ball gown to win suitors' approval instead of plucking orphan characters off the streets of my mind and trying to give them their own lives in hopes that they'll succeed at getting crowned a success, rather than just showing up and making a scene like Evernow's done. *sighs mournfully*

Coming and Going...

I'm going to be a little sporadic this week. Hopefully I'll get some sort of post up besides this one, but I make no promises. See, my stepgrandfather died unexpectedly on Friday, April 1. Only in my family can someone manage to drop dead and have everyone asking if they're really dead or if it's an April Fool's joke... only in my family of funeral director-types would anyone even expect that sort of April Fool's joke. Alas, it wasn't a joke, and now we're dealing with the aftermath of such things. Although this is a sad thing - he was a 'step' grandfather, but my birth grandfather died before I was born, and this man married my grandmother when I was only eight, so he's the only grandfather I've ever known on that side of the family - there will be funny stories to follow, I assure you.

I'll hint at them by saying thus far these topics have already been discussed:

The name of my grandfather's father... no one seems to remember it (?? we're leaning toward Lars, for no particular reason)

His sister's full name, no one seems sure of it, or how to list it in the obituary (again ??)

How we can somehow sneak his beloved dog's ashes into his urn, so they're interred together (something he's talked about wanting for years, but there's the small detail that it's apparently illegal to inter an animal on consecrated ground...)


Yeah, I'm definitely going to have a few funny stories to go alongside the sadness.